Training Log Archive: FoxShadow

The turtles were out in droves laying their eggs in Murphey. Biz and Molly and Kelly and I did a 47:00 jog to loosen up sore soccer/marathon muscles.

A fun loop around Murphey with Dan and Biz and Molly and Kelly. Saw two studs out training, Brendan Moore (best rider in the Midwest and current Trek Pro Team rider) and Larry Sauber. I tried to keep Brendan's pace. I was able to do it for 15 minutes. He was at the end of his third lap. He went back in for one more that I saw, and who know how many more after that. He is the chosen one. It was fun to check out his bike when he laid it down by the water fountain.

Kelly signed up for this morning's very hilly Stillwater marathon about 10 days prior to the gun. She had a very smart, very awesome race. As if she'd raced competitively before.

43:00 (in 2nd by 3 minutes) at the 10k, 1:34:00 (in 2nd by 3 minutes) at the half, 2:25:00 (in 2nd by 2 minutes) at the 20 mile mark, 3:11:00 in FIRST PLACE BY FOUR MINUTES AT THE FINISH! Incredible. Despite having a comfortable lead all day, the lead woman never had a chance. Kelly is the chosen one.

C • Excellent 9

Played a really fun game as a sub for my friend's NSC tourney team. We got rolled by a very skilled team that came in for the weekend from Iowa. They spoke English and Serbian and they were angry, constantly yelling at each other about how each other made the wrong choice. But they got along just well enough to bury us 6-0. I am really sore from the effort.

Often after riding at Hillside or Mammoth I'll think those trails are be the best in the state. Then I go back to Lebanon and remember that it is king. Year after year the king's reign remains unbroken. A few nice improvements again this year, Lebanon is Midwest riding in it's exalted state.

A XX loop to the X loop out to the parking lot for a fresh bottle and a banana. Then back in for an X loop out again and I was in MTB heaven all afternoon.

Up at 4:30AM tomorrow to take Kelly to the Stillwater marathon. Her hamstring has been sore all week after tweeking it last week trying to get ready for the race. I think she'll be fine, but I'm excited to find out for real.

Interval workout on the crushed gravel railroad trail. I'll be sore from this one. I need to be doing this stuff more often.

It was battle getting the 51 miles from my house to Afton by 6:30 when my mom had a retirement party that started at 5PM at which I wanted to make an appearance. 494 had a little something to say about it, and Kelly and I arrived at 6:50 in time to start riding promptly at 7. I got 8 laps in a bit under an hour, it was a hard effort. One that I should probably do more often. Good idea Ian!

Lap around the lake on the MTB. Finally got my new tubeless tires on after strugging with the rear one for quite a while, almost enough for me to promise myself to switch back to tubes, but no.

Quick lap around the lake before Kelly and I headed down to the Brave New Workshop to watch their new show "Toyota: The Great Runaway Musical". It was a good show as usual. A bit more racy than past shows, but it certainly made me laugh. I discovered the mixing of the caramel and the white cheddar popcorn flavoring, oh damn that was good.

Headed up to Elk River to Hillside park for some technical single track with Kelly and Dan and Matt. I think Kelly hated me for bringing her to the toughest riding in the state, but she fought through it with only a few tears here and there. I did a loop with everyone and then out for a second fast loop myself. It was ridiculously hot. Even at 6PM I think it was well over 90 degrees, but that's what training is about.

We did it! Biz and I paddled his old beast of a canoe from the Dam on Gray's bay to the safety bouys above the Minnehaha falls. We did it starting at 6PM, doing the second half in the dark, be we made it happen. Thanks to Kelly and Molly for meeting us in Edina on their bikes with words of encouragement. It was a great time. I really liked paddling through the gold courses as people were forced to play over us, and seeing the city from an entirely unique vantage point. Great adventure Biz, thanks for making it happen!

Did the fastest loop I could around the lake on my Road bike, averaged 19.9 mph with my cyclocross tires. I need to take those things off so I can get over 20.

OTNT at Murphy, hosted by Andrei. Got in a good run even though I had no chance of making it to Savage by 5PM, so I missed the bike. Good to catch up with MoBiz after the Atomic AR, and good to see the inner depths of Murphy, a beautiful park.

The Almanzo 100. The best bike race I have ever attended. Chris Skogen puts his heart into this event, for the benefit of his riders. The personal touch he puts on this event is beyond anything I've seen. From the course design, to the communication, the poster, the jersey, the fact that the race IS FREE, sponsors, everything sets a new standard for class. He hand wrote a letter to every participant, you just don't see that kind of a gesture anymore.

Onto the race: What a perfect day, 55 degrees to start, 65 at the end, sunny with a bit of a haze all day. I started along with 380 other riders promptly at 9AM behind a moped lead out.

A nice easy pace for the first few miles to get my legs into it before we started the near relentless climbing we would see for the next 95 miles. Around a turn and down a steep, shady hill I descended just behind the lead group of about 30 riders. As the hill continued down into a river valley I could sense our speed picking up to around 30, screaming over the top of the gravel as we approached a fairly gentle right hand turn.

Then up ahead I saw a guy starting to death spiral. This happens when you're going too fast with too much weight on the front tire. The bike begins to shake, subtly, then more and more until it skids out and you go down head first. Down he went. I hit my brakes but not too hard, there were another 300 riders behind me, plus I knew I would not be able to stop if I tried. Twenty five feet but probably less than a half second behind him, another rider ran into his ribs after locking up his brakes and not slowing down a bit. He ejected up and over the bleeding rider. He looked like a nascar wreck tumbling in the air. The rider to my left, unable to steer while braking, zoomed off the road into the ditch. I heard later that he snapped his frame. I subtly feathered my brakes enough to maintain directional control of my bike as I turned as sharply right as I could, to avoid the pileup in the middle of the road. Replays of Tour De France crashes flashed in my head. Many of us who avoided the pile up continued on. I heard later that about 10 riders went down hard in the pile up. Brandon, who I was riding with quickly hammered ahead to latch onto the lead group. I was PTSD, unable to pedal hard back onto the lead group, but unable to turn around and help. I wanted to turn around. But I knew I had to try to stay behind the leaders if I wanted to have the result that I have been training for. The result that I would make my hotel last night and the other sacrifices I made to be here worth it. I found other riders who wanted to rehash their stories with me and we talked for 20 minutes over the next hill, up and out of the river gorge. I continued to have slow-motion replays of this crash, the most violent I've ever seen. I found out at the end of the day that only one guy had to go the ER. A few others had concussions and injuries but nothing too serious. The speed and congestion was so great I consider that a good outcome.

After the crash my goal was to catch back up to Brandon, who I knew was in the lead group. I found a few other fast riders and we worked hard in a group of four to catch up. We worked for about 10 miles and were putting time into the leaders until we came to another beast of a hill. I could not keep up, or more accurately, knew that if I kept up then, I would not have the strength left in my legs 50 miles later. It would have taken a prolonged anaerobic effort. I was already at or above threshold. I dropped off the back, riding solo. This was at about mile 35 of 104.

Kelly met me at mile 42, I was still riding alone. I hastily grabbed a 5 hour energy, a PB&J sandwich, some HEED, two fresh bottles, and I was on my way.

I rode with a guy named Owen, an angry catfish rider, for a time. He told me he was trying to catch a Nature Valley rider ahead. I had seen this rider pass me a while back. Evidently they were split in the crash. This crash was like a war splitting up families the way we were all emotionally effected by it, physically torn apart by it, but united in our efforts to help one another get back together. I told him that if we got another guy or two I was confident we could catch him, because he was riding solo. We met Andy and Keith, two real strong guys who were working hard to get back up to the leaders, and we hammered together to mile 62, where our drop bags awaited us. We never caught the lead group, or that Nature Valley dude, he was really hauling.

At the shady drop bag site aside a great old white wooden barn I slammed a mountain dew, another PB&J, another 5 hour energy, a clif bar, some shot blocks, and put some GUs in my jersey pocket to replenish my stash. I looked back to find Owen, Andy and Keith. They were talking to their friend Mike. I said "Let's stay together" Let's go!" Owen was in. The other were still chatting. I started riding ahead slowly with Owen, this was enough to make the other three shut up and ride.

We entered a minimum maintenance road together around Mile 75. It had streams crossing it, one as deep as my calves. The cold water felt great on my aching feet. By this time my back was a large knot of pain. Radiating down my right leg and around my right hip. It hurt far more than my churning legs. I massaged it on the downhills, and swallowed some excedrin from my jersey pocket. We were working hard. Our group had passed about 5 riders over the preceding 20 miles. I was with a strong group and we worked together well. By this time conversation started to quiet as we each struggled in our heads with the pain. We continued to lay down an 18 mph pace on the gravel. We were flying, and we had been all day. I learned in chatting with them that they were CAT 2 roadies, some of the them raced mountain as well, both riding expert. I was riding out of my league today, I thought to myself.

Then Keith started to flat, we were at about mile 92. I told him I'd wait if he wanted to CO2 it. We only had to limp another 10 miles or so. He said he wanted to change the tube. Owen stopped and changed it with him. I continued on with Mike. Andy had been dropped by this time. Mike and I worked together at a moderate pace until we saw an older guy on a $5,000 bike ahead. We raced ahead to catch him. He latched onto our rear wheel. He looked to be about 50, but he was strong. His calves looked like pistons. He said he rode the first half too fast trying to stay in the lead group, but when the lead group disinegrated, he did too. We rode on, and I expected to see Owen and Keith again, but we hadn't. Now with only five miles to go, I knew it wasn't going to happen. Mike and I were churning out a fast pace to the finish. He wanted to finish under 6 hours. I didn't care, I just wanted a top 50 finish.

We crossed the line in 6:04:32, me in 24th place. 24th out of 440 registered, 380 starters, and 268 finishers. Averaged over 17 mph on gravel for over 100 miles. I could not have been happier.

Chris Skogen made it a point to personally shake every finishers hand. He awarded me with a sweet wireless bike computer, and $25 gift card as well. What a class act. I dropped a twenty into his donation box, but the ride was priceless.

C • you are out of your league,... 7

Almanzo 100 tomorrow. Headed down to Rochester right now exhausted. Hopefully I can get recharged tonight and get 'er done in style tomorrow. Go WEDALI at the Georgia Atomic AR!

Sup-burb-o-cross race! Great time, highly recommended. What a good job these guys do putting on this semi-annual event. I flatted out this time, but had a great time during and afterwards. Free Chipotle burritos for all who attended, how is this not the best race ever?

Recovery run to work out the kinks from the AR yesterday, and get ready to throw down at the Sup-burb-o-cross later tonight.

Running 9.97m 1.37.27
Paddling 10.8 2.40.00
Running 2.19m 41.09
Biking 15.48m 1.28.48
Running/Climbing 3.74m 1.10.00
Biking 13.5m 1.09.10

Thought I'd get time to write a race report. But not enough time to sleep lately. Hope to catch up soon.

Rest day. And by rest day, I mean spent the day moving out of my storage unit, then doing stump removal with a 25 hp vermeer and a pulaski, then doing demo on a basement in Bloomington and loading it into the dump trailer, then, digging some fence posts in. This is the kind of rest day you need to build the requisite toughness for the Sub-burb-o-cross tomorrow!

C • Glad to see 2

Fun running game in the primo woods of Battle Creek, which were the equivalent of running killers through the woods with a capture the flag twist on it to finish. Jeff edged me out by a few seconds for the win after we both trailed Curtis for the entire race, but he took a more conservative route to the finish.

Didn't know what a "Corridor-O" was until this fun training session. Thanks to Todd for a very cool idea and map. I can't really decide if I had success or not. I feel like I did a good job, as I completed most all of the course. But I know that if I had a GPS on it would look pretty ugly. I doubled back numerous times, and took trails many times when I knew the corridor was off trail. Overall, a fun exercise that helped my navigation. Legs felt pretty tired after all the hills on Monday.

Loop at Theo with Kelly before running with Mo and her impromptu crew.

Great run in Theo using the "Indian relay". Looped through many of the best hills and did a lot of hill repeats. Some of them quite hard and fast. Great workout.

Event: MNOC - Sand Dunes State Forest
 

Setting CP's at the Sand Dunes meet. Seemed to turn out well. I enjoyed learning the park.

Various runs to stay warm and watch athletes, etc.